The Food of the Gods~ Honey in the Hive, Medicine, Magic & Ritual
“Veiled in this fragile filigree of wax is the essence of sunshine, golden and limpid, tasting of grassy meadows, mountain wildflowers, lavishly blooming orange trees, or scrubby desert weeds. Honey, even more than wine, is a reflection of place. If the process of grape to glass is alchemy, then the trail from blossom to bottle is one of reflection. The nectar collected by the bee is the spirit and sap of the plant, its sweetest juice. Honey is the flower transmuted, its scent and beauty transformed into aroma and taste." ~Stephanie Rosenbaum
The honey created by honeybees is one of nature’s greatest gifts.
A sweet reflection of the land created through the alchemy of the honeybee and her relationship to the flowers.
“For to the bee the flower is a fountain if life
And to the flower the bee is a messenger of love
And to both, bee and flower,
the giving and the receiving is both a need and an ecstasy.”- Khalil Gibran
Without pollination & the mutually beneficial relationship between flowering plants and pollinators, life on earth would not have evolved. The evolution of bees is closely related to the evolution of flowering plants, the two evolved interdependently with the plants developing more structures to attract the pollinating insects from showy colorful petals to delicious nectar, a story of how the earth became so beautiful can be tied to the relationship between bees and flowers.
What is Honey and how is it created?
The honeybees create honey through their ingestion of nectar. The nectar comes from the body of the flower- which is made from the plant as it draws water and minerals from the earth. The honeybee gathers nectar from the flower and it is then stored in her “honey stomach.” Once this stomach is full the bee goes back to the hive where she regurgitates the nectar into the mouth of a house bee- this continues until the water content is reduced to about 19%. The stomachs of the bees contain enzymes which break down the complex sugars of the nectar into simpler sugars that are less prone to crystallization, this process is known as inversion. After this the house bees who received the honey will regurgitate into a cell this part of the process is crucial as an enzyme in the saliva of the bee known as invertase further breaks it down, after this the bees fan the nectar with their wings in a dehydration process to further reduce the water content. Once this is done the cell is capped with wax.
Honeybees must gather nectar from two million flower to create one pound of honey and one honeybee must fly 90,000 miles that’s three times around the globe to make one pound of honey.
Honey is a source of fuel and nutrition for the hive. The honeybees primarily make honey as a food source. It is their primary source of food in the winter months when there are no more flowers. The creation of honey is a way for the hive to preserve food so they can survive through the winter and periods where the nectar flow is low. The honeycomb isn’t just food either, it also serves as insulation for the hive during the colder months.
Honey is a food, medicine, & intoxicant
Honey is the only food produced by an insect that people eat. Honey provided sustenance for many early peoples. Besides carbohydrates, honey contains small amounts of protein, enzymes, vitamins, minerals and trace amino acids. Honey is also known to be rich in antioxidants.
When honey is converted into nectar an acid is produced known as glucose oxidase which releases hydrogen peroxide which helps to make honey so antibacterial. Honey also strongly attracts water due to its high sugar content this causes the honey to have a desiccating effect on the bacteria causing them to die. Honey is an incredibly healing & versatile substance which has been used for thousands of years in a wide range of ways.
Honey is the result of many forces in nature at play and most importantly it is a labor of love, a product of love between flower and bee, it is a substance reflecting the evolution of life on earth. Honey is also a sacred reflection of the landscape, when we eat honey from where we live, we connect more deeply to that land.
Honey has been viewed as an embodiment of all of creation. Rudolf Steiner said that “By way of the beehive the entire cosmos enters man.” Here he was referring to our ingestion of honey as a sacred and powerful substance capable of altering consciousness.
Ancient Uses of Honey
Ancient peoples knew these things of honey and honey and the bees that create it were deeply revered. Honey & the spirit created from it known as “mead” or “honey wine,” came to be known as “the food of the gods, & “the drink of the gods.”
Honey has been used for thousands of years by cultures and civilizations from around the world. From beginning with early hunters and gatherers to its use in ancient civilizations. In Ancient Egypt honey was perhaps one of the if not the most prized substances, they believed it to be a gift from the sun god Ra. There are several medical papyri that survived and have been interpreted by archaeologists. In them honey is mentioned a great deal and of the 900 recorded medicines 500 of them are honey based. Honey was integral in the mummification process as was beeswax & propolis. Honey acts as a preservative and is the only food that does not spoil so it was an incredibly useful substance to the Ancient Egyptians.
The Egyptians were also fond of brewing various wines, the most famous being their Blue Lotus wine which was consumed during important religious ceremonies, rituals, and celebrations. The flowers of Blue Lotus would be steeped in a wine, the alcohol of the wine would extract the compounds of the flower creating an intoxicating brew. It is not specifically stated what type of wine but due to extensive use of honey in Ancient Egypt it’s easy to infer that they made honey wines and consumed them in various rites, rituals, & celebrations.
In Ancient Greece honey was known as the food of the gods. Honey & mead were weaved throughout Ancient Greek culture & myth. Nectar and Ambrosia are frequently mentioned in the Homeric Hymns~ a collection of hymns written in Ancient Greece. Ambrosia is simply the Greek term to describe the food or drink of the gods which for the people of Ancient Greece & the earlier Minoan civilization was honey and honey wine. There is the classic myth of Zeus who as an infant deity resided in a cave where he was tended to by the Melissae who fed him on a diet of milk and honey. Melissae was the name given to priestesses and nymphs of both Minoan Civilization and Ancient Greece. In Greek Melissa translates to bee, therefore these women were called bee women. They worked intimately with the honeybee not only physically and with the medicines of the hive, but the honeybee was a living glyph or symbol that inspired much of their temple rites, rituals, and healing practices.
Alfred Dürer, 1514: “Eros, Venus and the Bees.”
The Melissae consumed an entheogenic honey which was a honey the bees would make after collecting nectar from rhododendron flowers which contain psychoactive compounds. The priestesses would consume said honey and enter into a trance from which they would prophecy. Many leaders and philosophers of ancient Greece would seek counsel from these wise women. These priestesses were described as being “divinely maddened,” after consuming entheogenic honeys & meads from which they would be able to prophesy and offer guidance to those seeking their council.
“The greatest blessings come to us through madness, when it is sent as a gift of the gods.”~ Socrates, Phaedrus
Mead, the muses, poetry~ The muses were originally nymphs inspiring springs and were later regarded as the goddesses of poetry, arts, and sciences were frequently connected in ancient times to bees and honey. They were said to grant men the gift of sweet speech, poetry, and eloquence through sending bees to their lips. This thread of honey, mead, and poetry can be found all around the world, hence we get the phrase “mellifluous tongue” which means flowing like honey and is used as a metaphor to describe pleasant sound and sweet & poetic speech.
Honey is a an incredibly healing substance with a wide range of uses. Due to its antiseptic properties honey makes an excellent first aid remedy that can aid in the healing of wounds and help to prevent the spread of infection. Honey has been traditionally used in the treatment of burns even extremely severe ones. It has a soothing quality to inflamed tissue states and helps to speed the healing of connective tissue.
In traditional systems of medicine such as Ayurveda and Traditional Chinese Medicine, honey is known to be harmonizing, moistening, warming, & nourishing. As such honey can be added to a variety of medicines to balance their energetics. This is why herbalists love honey so dearly, it can be added to various medicines and infused with medicinal herbs.
After all honey is made from flowers and alchemy, so naturally it would be a prized medicine.
Sourcing Honey
I often get questions about sourcing ethical honey, and I can honestly say this is a difficult question to answer. The beekeeping and honey production industry in and of itself has moved away from the understanding that honeybees and the honey they create is sacred. Honey has become a commodity and as a result beekeeping practices have become more and more industrialized to meet the demand of the industry.
My best advice here is to connect with local beekeepers in your area. You can do this by simply going to your local farmers markets or by simply searching for the beekeepers in your area. Get to know these beekeepers and ask questions about their practices and the scale of their operations.
The fact is we need beekeepers, but we also need to hold the industry and unethical & unsustainable practices accountable for the sake of our honeybees. There is so much I could elaborate on here, but I will save it for another blog. If you have any specific questions about honey sourcing, please feel free to reach out to me directly.
It is my hopes that in sharing these stories and information that we may begin to return to reverent relationship with the bees and all of nature. Honey has long been revered as a sacred substance, as the optimal offering to the gods and the goddess. Honey was central to many rites and rituals of ancient peoples and is still used in this way in many indigenous cultures around the world. For those living and who have lived in close relationship with this earth have the common understanding that everything born of nature is sacred and holy.
May we continue to return to this understanding.
